Saturnaliidae is a
family
Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...
of basal
sauropodomorph dinosaurs
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic Geological period, period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the #Evolutio ...
found in
Brazil
Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...
,
Argentina
Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...
and possibly
Zimbabwe
file:Zimbabwe, relief map.jpg, upright=1.22, Zimbabwe, relief map
Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Bots ...
.
It is not to be confused with Saturnalidae, a family of radiolarian protists.
Classification
In 2010,
Martin Ezcurra Martin may refer to:
Places Antarctica
* Martin Peninsula, Marie Byrd Land
* Port Martin, Adelie Land
* Point Martin, South Orkney Islands
Europe
* Martin, Croatia, a village
* Martin, Slovakia, a city
* Martín del Río, Aragón, Spain
* M ...
defined the subfamily Saturnaliinae for the clade containing ''
Saturnalia
Saturnalia is an Roman festivals, ancient Roman festival and holiday in honour of the List of Roman deities, god Saturn (mythology), Saturn, held on 17 December in the Julian calendar and later expanded with festivities until 19 December. By t ...
'' and ''
Chromogisaurus'', which were found to be close relatives in several studies.
While they are sometimes found to be a subgroup within the
Guaibasauridae,
all recent studies have found the saturnaliines to form an independent lineage at the very base of the sauropodomorph family tree.
At one point, ''
Agnosphitys'' was recovered as a possible saturnaliine until it was recovered as a member of
Silesauridae in 2017.
[Baron, M.G., Norman, D.B., and Barrett, P.M. (2017). A new hypothesis of dinosaur relationships and early dinosaur evolution. ''Nature'', 543: 501–506. ] Langer and colleagues (2019) recovered ''
Pampadromaeus'' and ''
Panphagia'' as relatives of ''Saturnalia'' and ''Chromogisaurus'', elevating Saturnaliinae to family rank as Saturnaliidae. In that particular paper, they recovered ''Guaibasaurus'' as a basal theropod.
[Langer MC, McPhee BW, Marsola JCdA, Roberto-da-Silva L, Cabreira SF (2019) Anatomy of the dinosaur '' Pampadromaeus barberenai'' (Saurischia—Sauropodomorpha) from the Late Triassic Santa Maria Formation of southern Brazil. PLoS ONE 14(2): e0212543. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0212543]
Additionally, ''
Eoraptor
''Eoraptor'' () is a genus of small, lightly built, Basal (phylogenetics), basal sauropodomorpha, sauropodomorph dinosaur. One of the earliest-known dinosaurs and one of the earliest sauropodomorphs, it lived approximately 231 to 228 million yea ...
'', ''
Buriolestes'', ''
Bagualosaurus'' and especially ''
Nhandumirim'' are also possible members of this clade following their position in many recent phylogenetic analyses
and the new definition given by Langer et al. (2019), as "the maximal sauropodomorph clade to encompass ''Saturnalia'' but not ''
Plateosaurus''."
In several of these analyses, ''Guaibasaurus'' is recovered as distantly related to ''Saturnalia'', sometimes as a more basal sauropodomorph or saurischian, and in some cases specifically related to more derived taxa such as ''
Macrocollum
''Macrocollum'' is a genus of unaysauridae, unaysaurid sauropodomorph dinosaur that lived during the Late Triassic period (geology), period (early Norian) in what is now Brazil. It is one of the oldest dinosaurs known.
Discovery and naming
''Mac ...
'' and ''
Unaysaurus.'' This way a Guaibasauridae including ''Saturnalia'' and kin is no longer being supported.
References
{{Taxonbar, from=Q2591790
Dinosaur families
Carnian dinosaurs
Dinosaurs of South America